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The Univerfities feem to pride themfelves greatly on their choice collections of curious and invaluable trifles, which are there preferved, only because they were not thought worth preferving any where elfe. But is the Ashmolean Collection of Rarities comparable to the Nicknackatory of Mr. Pinchbeck? Or are any of their Mufæums ftored with fuch precious curiofities, as are frequently feen in Mr. Langford's Auction-room? Strangers, who think it worth while to go fo far as Oxford or Cambridge to fee fights, may furely meet with as much fatisfaction at London. Are the two little pigmies, ftriking a clock at Carfax in Oxford, within any degree of comparifon with the two noble giants at St. Dunstan's Church in Fleet Street; to fay nothing of their enormous brethren at Guild Hall? Are any of the College Halls in either of the univerfities, fo magnificent as thofe belonging to our worthipful companies? Or can the Theatre at Oxford, or the Senate houfe at Cambridge, vie with that stupendous piece of architecture the Manfion-houfe, fet apart for our Chancellor the Lord Mayor? It may be alledged, perhaps, that these are trifling examples of fupe

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riority, which the younger fifter bears over her two elder: but at the fame time, it cannot be denied, that the excels them both even in the minutiae of learning and antiquity.

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We must confefs, that Hydraulics, or the Motion of Fluids, feem to be taught exactly in the fame manner, and with the fame degree of knowledge, in London, as in Oxford or Cambridge. The Glafs Tubes, and the Syphons, are formed very much in the fame shape and fashion. The great Hydrostatical law, That all fluids gravitate in proprio loco,' is proved by the fame kind of experiments. The feveral ftudents, of whatever age or ftation, vie with each other in an unwearied application, and a conftant attendance to this branch of mixed mathematics. The Profeffors, in each of the three Universities, are confeffedly very great men: but I hope I may be forgiven, if I wish to fee my friend Mr. Ryan, prefident of the King's Arms in Pall Mall, unanimously declared Vice-chancellor of the University of London. I am, Sir, your humble fervant,

No XVIII. THURSDAY, MAY 30, 1754.

NIHIL EST FURACIUS ILLO:

NON FUIT AUTOLYCI TAM PICEATA MANUS.

MART.

COULD HE HAVE FILCH'D BUT HALF SO SLY AS THEE,
CROOK-FINGER'D JACK HAD 'SCAP'D THE TRIPLE TREE.

N information was the other day laid before a magiftrate by a Fellow of the Society of Antiquarians, against one of his brethren for a robbery. The profecutor depofed upon oath, that the other had called upon him to fee his collection of medals, and took an opportunity of stealing a leathern purfe, formerly belonging to the celebrated Tom Hearne, in which were contained, (befides an antique piece of copper money, place, date, name, figure, and value unknown) a pair of breeches of Oliver Cromwell, a denarius of Trajan worth fifty fhillings, and a Queen Anne's farthing value five pound. He was with much ado diffuaded from carrying on his fuit; as the magistrate convinced him, that however highly he might rate

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his own treasures, a jury, who were na Virtuofos, would confider a farthing merely as a farthing, and look upon a copper coin of a Roman Emperor as ne better than a King George's halfpenny.

I cannot, indeed, without geat concern, as a Connoiffuer, reflect on the known difhonefty of my learned brethren. The fcandalous practices, whereever their darling paffion is interested, are too notorious to be denied. The moment they conceive a love for rarities, and antiques, their strict notions of honour disappear; and Tate, the more it establishes their veneration for Virtù, the more certainly destroys their integrity: as ruft enhances the value of an old coin, by eating up the figure and infcription.

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Moft people are mafters of a kind of logic, by which they argue their confciences to fleep, and acquit themselves of doing what is wrong. The country fquire of confirmed honefty in all other refpects, thinks it very fair to over-reach you in the fale of an horfe; and the man of pleasure, who would fcorn to pick your pocket, or ftop you on the read, regards it rather as gallantry than bafenefs, to intrigue with your wife or daughter. In the fame manner the Vir. tuofe does not look on his thefts as real acts of felony; but while he owns that he would take any pains to fteal an old rufty piece of brafs, boats that you may fafely truft him with untold gold: though he would break open your cabinet for a fhell or a butterfly, he would not attempt to force your escritoire or your ftrong box; nor would he offer the leaft violence to your wife or daughter, though perhaps he would run away with the little finger of the Venus de Medicis. Upon thefe principles he proceeds, and lays hold of all opportunities to increafe his collection of rarities: and as Mahomet established his religion by the fword, the Connoiffeur enlarges his Mufæum, and adds to his store of knowledge, by fraud and petty larceny.

If the libraries and cabinets of the curious were, like the daw in the fable, to be stripped of their borrowed ornaments, we fhould in many fee nothing but bare fhelves and empty drawers. I know a medalift, who at first fet up with little more than a paltry feries of English coins fince the Reformation, which he had the good luck to pick up at their intrinfic value. By a pliant ufe of his fingers he became foon poffeffed of moft of the Traders; and by the fame flight of hand, he, in a fhort time after, made himfelf matter of great part of the Ca. fars. He was once taken up for coining; a forge, a crucible, and feveral dies, being found in his cellar: but he was acquitted, as there was no law which made it high treafon to counterfeit the image of a Tiberius or a Nero; and the coin, which he imitated, was current only among Virtuofos.

I remember another, who piqued himself on his collection of fcarce editions and original manufcripts, most of which he had purloined from the libraries of others. He was continually borrowing books of his acquaintance, with refolution never to return them. He

would fend in a great hurry for a particular edition, which he wanted to confult only for a moment; but when it was afked for again, he was not home, or he had lent it to another, or he had loft it, or he could not find it; and fometimes he would not fcruple to fwear, that he had himfelf delivered it into the owner's hands. He would frequently spoil a fet by ftealing a volume, and then purchase the reft for a trifle. After his death his library was fold by auction; and many of his friends were obliged to buy up their own books again at an exorbitant price.

A thorough-bred Virtuofo will furmount all fcruples of confcience, or encounter any danger to ferve his purpose. Most of them are chiefly attached to fome particular branch of knowledge; but I remember one, who was paffionately fond of every part of Virtù. At one time, when he could find no other way of carrying off a medal, he ran the risk of being choaked by fwallowing it; and at another, broke his leg in fcaling a garden-wall for a tulip-root. But nothing gave him fo much trouble and difficulty as the taking away pictures and ancient marbles; which being heavy and unwieldy, he often endangered his life to gratify his curiofity. He was once locked up all night in the Duke of Tufcany's gallery, where he took out an original painting of Raphael, and dextroufly placed a copy of it in the frame. At Venice he turned Roman Catholic, and became a Jefuit, in order to get admittance into a convent, from whence he ftole a fine head of Ignatius Loyola; and at Conftantinople he had almost formed the refolution of qualifying himfelf for the Seraglio, that he might find means to carry off a picture of the Grand Signior's chief mistress.

The general difhonefty of Connciffeurs is indeed fo well known, that the strictelt precaution is taken to guard againft it. Medals are fecured under lock and key, pictures fcrewed to the walls, and books chained to the fhelves; yet cabinets, galleries, and libraries, are continually plundered. Many of the maimed ftatues at Rome perhaps owe their prefent ruinous condition to the depredations made on them by Virtuofoss the head of Henry the Fifth, in Weft minster Abbey, was in all probability stolen by a Connoiffeur; and I know one who has at different times pilfered a great

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part of Queen Catherine's Bones, and hopes in a little while to be master of the whole skeleton. This gentleman has been detected in fo many little thefts, that he has for feveral years paft heen refufed admittance into the Mufæums of the curious; and he is lately gone abroad with a defign upon the ancient Greek manufcripts difcovered at Herculaneum.

It may seem furprising, that thefe gentlemen fhould have been hitherto fuffered to escape unpunished for their repeated thefts, and that a Virtuofo, who robs you of an Unic of inestimable value, fhould even glory in the action, while a poor dog, who picks your pocket of fixpence, fhall be hanged for it. What a fhocking difgrace would be brought upon Taite, fhould we ever fee the dying fpeech, confeffion, and behaviour, of a Connoiffeur, related in the account of malefactors by the ordinary of Newgate! Such an accident would doubtless bring the ftudy of Virtù into still more contempt among the ignorant, when they found that it only brought a man to the gallows; as the country fellow, when he faw an attorney ftand in the pillory for forgery, fhook his head and cried Ay, this comes of your writing and reading.' It were perhaps

worthy the confideration of the legifla ture to devife fome punishment for these offenders which fhould bear fome analogy with their crimes: and as common malefactors are delivered to the furgeons to be anatomized, I would propofe, that a Connoiffeur fhould be made into a Mummy, and preferved in the hall of the Royal Society, for the terror and admiration of his brethren.

I fhall conclude this paper with the relation of a circumstance, which fell within my own knowledge when I was abroad, and in which I declined a glorious opportunity of fignalizing myself as a Connoiffeur. While I was at Rome, a young phyfician of our party, who was eaten up with Virtù, made a ferious propofal to us of breaking into one of the churches by night, and taking away a famous piece of painting over the altar. As I had not quite tafte enough to come at once into his fcheme, I could not help objecting to him, that it was a robbery. Pob, fays he, it is a moft • exquifite picture!” · Ay, but it is 'not only a robbery, but facrilege. Oh, it is a most charming piece!'Zounds, doctor, but if we thould be taken, we fhall all be broke upon the wheel. Then,' said he, we fall 'die MARTYRS.'

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N° XIX. THURSDAY, JUNE 6, 1754

POSCENTES VARIO MULTUM DIVERSA PALATO.

HOR.

HOW VERY ILL OUR DIFFERENT TASTES AGREE;
THIS WILL HAVE BEEF, AND THAT A FRICASSEE.

Have felected the following letters from a great number, which I have lately been favoured with from nnknown correspondents; and as they both relate nearly to the fame fubject, I fhall without further preface fubmit them to the public.

SIR,

WHEN you was got into White's,

I was in hopes that you would not have confined yourself merely to the gaming-table, but have given us an account of the entertainment at their ordinaries. A bill of fare from thence would have been full as diverting to

your readers, as the laws of the game, or a lift of their bets. gentlemen, we are told, are no lefs adepts in the fcience of eating than of gaming; and as Hoyle has reduced the latter into a new and compleat fyftem, I could wish that their cook, (who to be sure is a Frenchman) would alfo oblige the world by a treatife on the art and myf tery of fauces.

Indeed, Mr. Town, it furprifes me, that you have fo long neglected to make fome reflections on the Diet of this great city. Dr. Martin Lifter, who was univerfally allowed to be a great Connoiffeur, and published feveral learned trea

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